THURSDAY [24] theatre • Rubber Repertory presents A Thought in Three Parts at The Vortex (8pm) music • Emissions From the Monolith Fest at Emo's music • Small Stars, Sounds Under Radio at Stubb's music • DJ Qbert, DJ Craze, DJ Klever, Table Manners Crew at The Parish music • Winovino, Bourbon Legends, Jett Mullens, Jaime Thomas at Beerland music • Morrissey Pre-Party with Andy Rourke! at The Mohawk music • Gulf of Mexico,... more ›

This Thursday, May 24th, Marisha Pessl will be at BookPeople to support the paperback release of her hefty debut tome Special Topics in Calamity Physics. We gave it a thorough reading about a year ago and you can read the review here. more ›

Looking for some extracurricular, non-Barack Obama-related Texas Book Festival fun? The Gallery at the Continental Club will be hosting The Lolita Update: The Romantic Devastations of Youth in Fiction on Saturday night at 8:00pm. Mark Binelli, Rolling Stone contributing editor and author of Sacco and Vanzetti Must Die!, will be opening with a vaudevillian skit involving anarchists and knives. The evening’s centerpiece is a panel discussion concerning young love, adolescence, and fiery loins. The panel... more ›

The first impression you are likely to get from Marisha Pessl's Special Topics in Calamity Physics is that the book is the author's attempt to inform the world that she's a genius. You are given Blue van Meer, daughter of renowned professor Gareth van Meer and the late Natasha Alicia Bridges van Meer, and from her perspective you are then given an imperial heft of literary, academic, and cultural allusions. Blue is smart, and her father is the smartest. For the sake of snarkiness it could be safely assumed that the salient theme of the book's first part is "Look at these two van Meers, how smart they are." more ›